


Do It for Vere

by nikkiRA



Category: Captive Prince - C. S. Pacat
Genre: Laurent's POV, M/M, this is all based on memory so don't kill me if things are a little off, this is like........so weirdly choppy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-12
Updated: 2016-04-12
Packaged: 2018-06-01 22:45:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,103
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6539575
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nikkiRA/pseuds/nikkiRA
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>One of these days, he knows, he is going to start running out of excuses.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Do It for Vere

**Author's Note:**

> what is this tbh lmao

One of these days, he knows, he is going to start running out of excuses.

* * *

He needs the Akielon. He knows this. And he does have his merits. He would have to; princes generally did, even those in hiding. He needed him to teach him the language, which was still foreign and heavy in his mouth. He needed his expertise, his planning, the way he handles the army.

He would have been a good king, Laurent thinks bitterly.

So he needs Damianos. He can accept that. He is willing to do anything he needs to for his throne. If that involves allying himself with his enemy, fine. Vere is worth it.

That is his mantra. _Vere is worth it. Do it for Vere._ That is what he says to himself. That is what he says to himself during late nights with no sleep, a map between them. That is what he says to himself with an earring dangling from his ear in an inn. What he says to himself pressed up against a wall by a giant body, frantically stifling his laughter. Ignoring the warmth spreading through him.

That is what he says to himself with a hand on his face and a body pressing up against him, unbelievably warm. Vere is worth it. He would do anything for Vere.

Even kiss the man who killed his brother.

( _Do it for Vere_ doesn’t explain why he was so upset when Jord interrupted. He vows not to think about it.)

* * *

_Do it for Vere._

The sex could be explained. Honestly it could. He needed Damianos to trust him. And he knows Damianos wants him. And it is in his best interest, he tells himself, to keep him happy for now.

His excuses are running thin, he admits.

* * *

_Do it for Vere._

He wanted him to stay. There was no excuse for that. No excuse for the three days.

* * *

There was no excuse for asking for the wrist cuff, either.

* * *

_Do it for Vere._

After so long of convincing himself, this is almost welcome. Alcohol. He can do that. It is easier to impress with alcohol than with sex. If Makedon needs him to drink, he will drink.

But he is reminded very quickly why he dislikes alcohol. He likes control. He needs it.

“I miss you.”

It is true, and there is no excuse for that, either.

* * *

Laurent had always thought of sex as dirty. Something that was acted upon him. It had been a burden for years, something heavy on his shoulders, whispers that followed him around.

It is different with Damen, in a way he didn’t believe sex could be. Damen treats his body reverently, makes him forget all the previous conceptions he had had about what this was supposed to be like and transforms them into pleasure. He learns the lines and curves of his body, presses his lips to Laurent’s skin, and Laurent can feel his pulse, can feel the fluttering of his heart as he presses against him, and he is warm in the nicest way possible. Damen’s hands are large on his body, and Laurent feels, inexplicably, _safe_ , in a way he had never thought possible.

There are no excuses anymore, but he doesn’t care. This is not for Vere. This is for him.

* * *

He thinks that he probably realizes that he is in love with him when Damen ignores a centuries old law to try and kill the Regent right then and there. He watches in horror as Damen fights through guard after guard and Laurent realizes his size, realizes the strength he has, this Akielon giant, and the fact that all that strength is for him, right now. Damen is fighting for him. Damen is ready to pull his uncle apart with his bare hands, and all for Laurent.

He hadn’t wanted Damen to know. He had wanted to stay whole. He hadn’t wanted his image to fracture apart under the knowledge of what he had done.

( _Of what was done to you,_ Damen says when Laurent finally admits this, voice gentle but firm, hands spread out on Laurent’s skin. _You didn’t do a damn thing._ Laurent had kissed him and hoped that Damen didn’t notice how tightly Laurent was clutching at him.)

* * *

_Do it for Vere_ stops working as a mantra the minute he turned himself over to his uncle.

* * *

From the time Laurent was thirteen he had trained, vigorously, taking hands that were used to holding books and wrapping them around a sword. Auguste had been the natural fighter, and Laurent, comfortable under the knowledge that Auguste was the prince he needed to be, holed himself up in the library and learned. He could fight, as was expected of a Veretian prince, but he was nothing like Auguste. A fact that he was reminded of daily.

He honed his muscles around Akielon fighting styles, learning the weaknesses, bettering himself until he could best the man who had beaten his brother.  It was childish naiveté, thinking that he could beat the man who had killed the best swordsman Laurent had ever known, but he was thirteen and mourning and determined. Once he had seen Damen fight he realized it had been an impossible dream from the beginning. Any man who could beat Auguste would be more than able to hold his own against the younger brother.

He had wanted to kill Damianos, and he would have failed.

But Kastor was not Damianos. Kastor was bigger, Kastor was almost twice his age, and Kastor was confident to the point of egotistical, but Kastor was not Damianos. Kastor laughed as Laurent faced him, looking down at the idiot young man who dared to challenge him, and Laurent takes all that anger, all those years of training, the hatred he had reserved for Prince Damianos of Akielos and turns it onto his brother.

He is not dense enough not to see the symmetry. He fights Kastor beside the ghost of his brother, and where Auguste had failed Laurent succeeds, because he is not Auguste and Kastor is not Damen.

When he cuts Kastor down, he doesn’t watch him fall. He turns back to Damen, who is still bleeding on the floor. Damen tears his eyes away from his brother’s body and looks at Laurent. He is in pain, Laurent can tell, but he gazes at Laurent with a look in his eyes that makes Laurent’s heart beat faster in his chest.

Damen kisses him and he lets him. He thinks this is probably what the rest of his life is going to look like.

He kisses him back.

**Author's Note:**

> this book series was so weird to me because after i read the first book i was like "i hate this book i can't believe everyone is so crazy about it" but i read the second anyway and HERE WE ARE


End file.
